Miami Car Accident Lawyer

If another driver hit you in Miami, you’re probably juggling medical appointments, a wrecked car, and calls from an adjuster who doesn’t work for you.

A lot of people assume they don’t have a case because “Florida is a no-fault state.” That’s only half the story. Yes, your own PIP coverage pays up to $10,000 toward medical bills and lost wages regardless of fault. But Florida law also lets you bring a claim against the at-fault driver if your injuries meet the statute’s “serious injury” threshold: permanent injury, significant scarring, or loss of an important bodily function. Most of these claims resolve in pre-suit through a demand to the at-fault driver’s insurer, without a lawsuit ever being filed. We file suit only when the carrier refuses to pay what the case is worth.

The other thing nobody tells you: whether an injury is “permanent” in the legal sense is a medical determination, usually based on an MRI or specialist evaluation, and that call often doesn’t get made until weeks or months into treatment. Soft tissue injuries almost never get rated as permanent on day one. Don’t write off your own case before a doctor has actually looked at it.

I grew up in Miami, and we take cases throughout Florida from our North Miami Beach office. When you call (305) 694-2676, you talk to a real attorney, not an intake screener, and in most cases you’ll be on the phone with me directly, either on that call or later the same day. Free consultation, and I can usually tell you on a short call whether you have a real claim. No fee unless we recover.

Why Hire a Miami Car Accident Lawyer

Most of the work that decides a car accident case happens in the first thirty days. That is before the average person has even thought about hiring a lawyer. By the time a client calls us six months in, frustrated with their adjuster, the most useful evidence is often already overwritten and the most important medical decisions have already been made without a strategy behind them.

Here is the work we actually do at Prosper Injury Attorneys.

Locking down the crash evidence

The clock on a car accident case starts the day of the wreck. The evidence has its own clock, and it runs out faster than people think.

The at-fault driver’s vehicle has an Event Data Recorder (the “black box”) that records pre-impact speed, brake input, throttle position, and seatbelt status. That data gets overwritten the next time the car is driven, and once the vehicle is repaired or sold, it is effectively gone. On the cases that warrant it, we pay to have the EDR data professionally extracted and downloaded. A lot of firms skip this step because of the cost. We do not, and we explain to clients up front why it is worth doing. For a deeper read on how EDR data works and why it matters, see What Is an Event Data Recorder (EDR) and How Can It Help Prove Fault?

Surveillance footage from a gas station, a 7-Eleven, a Sedano’s parking lot, or a city traffic camera at an intersection like NW 7th Avenue and 79th Street usually overwrites on a 14-to-72-hour cycle. The Florida traffic crash report (long form) takes weeks to come out of FHP or MDPD, often missing details that need to be added through the responding deputy.

When I take a case, the first thing my office does is send preservation letters to every party who might be holding evidence: the at-fault driver, the rideshare company, the trucking carrier, the bar that overserved the drunk driver, the property owner whose camera caught the impact. We get behind those letters fast. In most cases the difference between “we have video” and “we have nothing” is a phone call made within seventy-two hours.

A client of ours was struck mid-turn by another vehicle while making a protected left at a Miami intersection. The responding trooper issued no citation and the report listed conflicting statements from both drivers with no independent witness, which left the at-fault driver’s insurer free to deny liability outright and blame our client for running a red light. We had her Event Data Recorder professionally extracted. The data showed she had been fully stopped before the turn, then accelerated steadily from one to seventeen miles per hour over four seconds, applying brakes only in the final half-second before impact. That driving pattern is consistent with proceeding lawfully on a green arrow, not with attempting to beat a red light. We also ran a region-of-interest pixel analysis on the footage from her vehicle’s collision-avoidance camera, which revealed green hue values embedded in the digital file at the position of the signal cluster’s left turn arrow, despite glare washing the lamp white to the naked eye. The carrier reversed its denial and tendered the at-fault driver’s full bodily injury policy limits.

The insurance adjusters who will call you after a crash

You will deal with at least two insurance carriers after a crash: your own and the at-fault driver’s. The actual number of adjusters who call you is usually higher than two, because each carrier routes different parts of the claim to different adjusters. A realistic picture:

• Your own PIP adjuster, handling medical and wage benefits under your no-fault coverage.
• Your own collision adjuster, if you carry collision coverage. You will probably hear from this person early in the case, but using your collision coverage to repair the car when you were not at fault is a choice, not a requirement. We walk through that decision with the client before anything moves.
• The at-fault carrier’s bodily injury adjuster, handling the injury claim against the at-fault driver.
• The at-fault carrier’s property damage adjuster, handling vehicle damage, total-loss valuation, rental authorization, and storage fees.

All of them will call. All of them will sound reasonable. They each have an interest in what you say.

Your own carrier is allowed to take a recorded statement under your PIP policy. The at-fault carrier wants one to lock you into a description of the crash and your injuries before you have seen a specialist or had any imaging done. Anything you say can be used against you, even when it sounds harmless. (“I felt okay at the scene.” “I didn’t go to the hospital that day.” “My back wasn’t really hurting at first.”) Adjusters know how to ask questions that make a soft-tissue case sound like nothing.

Once you sign with us, you do not talk to any of them. We do.

Medical care after PIP runs out

Florida PIP covers 80% of the first $10,000 in medical bills, but only if you treat within 14 days of the crash, and the full $10,000 is not automatic: unless a qualified provider determines you had an emergency medical condition (EMC), PIP medical benefits are capped at $2,500. Even the full cap goes faster than most people expect. A single MRI plus a few specialist visits can blow through it before physical therapy even starts. Most clients we work with do not have unlimited health insurance to fall back on, and even those who do often run into out-of-network problems with the orthopedists and neurologists they actually need.

The way around this is a Letter of Protection (LOP). We have long-standing relationships with orthopedists, neurologists, pain management specialists, imaging centers, and physical therapists across Miami-Dade who treat our clients on an LOP basis. The provider agrees to wait for payment until the case settles. The client gets the treatment the injury actually needs. We document it the right way for the file. The bills get paid out of the recovery at the end. For more serious injuries, the Miami trauma centers and hospitals our clients regularly end up at include Jackson Memorial Hospital, Mount Sinai Medical Center, and HCA Florida Aventura Hospital. We make sure the treatment continues at the right pace and that the records get built out the way the case needs them to be built out.

Letters of protection now sit inside a stricter disclosure framework. Fla. Stat. § 768.0427, enacted as part of HB 837 in 2023, requires that a party using a letter of protection disclose its existence, identify the provider, document the payment terms, and disclose any referral relationship between the attorney and the provider. The same statute caps the amount of unpaid LOP medical bills that can be put in front of a jury, tying admissibility to reasonable rates rather than the gross billed amount. We document LOPs the right way from the day they are entered, because the file has to satisfy that framework if the case ever gets to trial.

Property damage, free of charge

Most personal injury firms do not handle property damage claims. The larger billboard advertising firms in particular tell clients at the gate: we are representing you for the bodily injury claim only, go handle your car damage yourself. Then those clients are left dealing with the property damage adjuster, the rental car authorization, the storage fees, and the total-loss valuation alone, while injured and trying to focus on treatment.

I have personally taken calls from people who already had an injury attorney but called our office for help with the property damage piece because their own lawyer would not touch it. We handle the property damage claim, including vehicle repairs or total-loss valuation, rental car coverage, and diminished value where applicable, at no fee, as part of representing the client on the bodily injury claim. It is not a separate matter. It is part of taking on the case.

Proving the threshold injury

Florida’s no-fault system bars a bodily injury claim against the at-fault driver unless the injury crosses the “serious injury threshold” under Fla. Stat. § 627.737: significant and permanent loss of an important bodily function, permanent injury within a reasonable degree of medical probability (other than scarring or disfigurement), significant and permanent scarring or disfigurement, or death.

Whether your injury is “permanent” is a medical determination, not a legal one, and it does not get made until imaging and specialist evaluations come back. A herniated disc on an MRI can support a permanency rating. A torn rotator cuff can. A traumatic brain injury identified on neuropsych testing can. A neck strain that resolves in eight weeks usually cannot. Adjusters will try to settle a case before treatment is far enough along to know whether the threshold is met. We do not.

Pushing past the insurer’s first offer

Insurance carriers track which firms file lawsuits and which firms do not. The firms that don’t file get the lowest offers, every time. The first offer is almost always a fraction of what the case is worth, and the adjuster’s authority to settle goes up significantly once a complaint is on file.

We work the case to a number that reflects the full damages: medical bills, lost wages, future treatment, pain and suffering, and where applicable the long-term impact on the client’s ability to work or live the way they did before. If the carrier will not engage seriously, we file. The threat of trial is only credible if the firm has actually tried cases. We have.

Florida Car Accident Numbers to Know

Call us today at (305) 694-2676 or contact us online for a free case evaluation. Hablamos español.

How We Structure the Demand

The demand is the most consequential single document a personal injury firm produces on a client’s behalf. It frames liability. It quantifies damages. It identifies every piece of evidence in the file. It sets the deadline by which the carrier has to take a position.

At Prosper Injury Attorneys, our demand packages are usually comprehensive PDFs, several hundred pages long. The cover letter walks through the facts and liability, the injuries and treatment received, future medical needs where applicable, every line item of medical expense, every health insurance lien, every PIP or health insurance payment to a provider, and (when there is a wage claim) past and future lost wages with the calculation behind them. The attached exhibits include every set of medical records and bills from every provider, the crash report, scene and damage photos, repair estimates and records, HIPAA logs, lien paperwork, and any video evidence. The cover letter closes with a specific dollar demand and a specific deadline, usually twenty days.

When we send the demand

Most demands go out at maximum medical improvement (MMI). MMI is the point where doctors agree the client’s treatment has stabilized and gone as far as it can. Settling earlier usually leaves money on the table for treatment the client ends up needing later.

There is one common exception. When the at-fault driver’s available bodily injury coverage is obviously inadequate for the injury, and the carrier’s duty to tender is plain on the facts, we send the demand well before MMI. A $10,000 bodily injury policy against a documented broken wrist is the textbook example. The damages clearly exceed the limits. The carrier knows it. Waiting on MMI in that posture costs the client time and accomplishes nothing.

Demands in catastrophic injury cases

On catastrophic cases the demand sometimes includes a full life care plan from a certified life care planner as a separate attachment. A day-in-the-life video or a settlement brochure can be added when the magnitude of the loss justifies the production cost. These are not standard add-ons. They are reserved for cases where they actually change how the carrier evaluates the file.

Written client authorization before any settlement

Before we put a number in front of the carrier, and before we accept any number from the carrier, the client signs off in writing on the floor we will accept. We talk through the strengths and weaknesses of the case, what I think it is worth, and what factors could move that number up or down. The client then gives the firm written authority to settle for at least a specific gross figure. No case here settles below the figure the client has authorized.

This is a step a lot of higher-volume firms skip. I have personally taken calls from people whose lawyers settled their cases for less than the client expected, sometimes without the client’s clear consent at all. We do not operate that way.

What the client should expect after the demand goes out

Clients are told the exact date the carrier has to respond by. The transparency saves clients from calling the office four times during the window asking if anything has come in. When the response arrives, the client gets it within twenty-four hours. If the deadline passes without a response or a requested extension, we follow up with the adjuster. That follow-up usually produces a response within days, often with an apology for the delay. If the carrier ignores the demand entirely, the conversation becomes about whether to wait longer or file the lawsuit. That call depends on the facts of the case and what the file looks like at that point.

PIP, BI, and UM/UIM at a Glance

Three different layers of coverage interact in a typical Florida car accident claim. Here is who pays what:

The mistake we see constantly: someone gets in a wreck, treats with PIP for a few weeks, gets told by an adjuster that PIP is “all that’s available,” and never opens a BI or UM/UIM claim. Often that is wrong. Whether you have a BI case turns on facts the adjuster does not tell you about: the imaging, the specialist’s permanency rating, the at-fault driver’s coverage, your own UM/UIM policy. PIP is required in Florida under Fla. Stat. § 627.736; BI is not. We can usually figure out in one phone call which layers are actually in play.

Florida’s Modified Comparative Negligence Rule (HB 837)

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If you are more than 50% at fault for the wreck, you cannot recover anything. If you are 50% or less at fault, your recovery is reduced by your percentage of fault. That is the rule under Fla. Stat. § 768.81 as amended by HB 837 in March 2023, and it applies to every Florida car accident case based on a crash that occurred on or after the effective date.

A worked example. If a jury values the case at $200,000 and finds you 25% at fault, you take home $150,000. If they find you exactly 50% at fault, you still take home $100,000. If they find you 51% at fault, you take home zero.

Comparative fault is one of the first arguments carriers raise to chip down a payout. They will point to a brake-check, a missed signal, “you should have seen them coming.” They will argue you were not wearing a seatbelt. They will lean on the police report wherever the responding officer hedged. Most of those arguments are exaggerated, and the difference between “you were 30% at fault” and “you were 51% at fault” can be a six-figure swing on the same facts.

What if the police report says I was at fault?

The police report is not the final word. Responding officers make a quick call based on what they can see at the scene, and that call frequently does not survive review of the actual evidence: surveillance video, witness statements, EDR data, scene photos, accident reconstruction. We have handled cases where the on-scene officer cited our client and we still recovered the full case value because the underlying evidence told a different story. Do not write off your case based on a citation.

How fault is determined in a Florida car accident

Fault is rarely settled at the scene. The responding officer makes a preliminary call based on driver statements, vehicle positions, and any visible debris or skid marks. That call goes into the crash report. It is the starting point, not the answer.

What actually decides fault in a contested case:

• Event Data Recorder (EDR) data. Speed, brake input, throttle position, and seatbelt status in the seconds before impact. The most authoritative single source on the cars’ behavior. See our explainer on how EDR data works.
• Surveillance footage. Gas station cameras, business cameras, traffic cameras, dashcams, and ring-style residential cameras. Usually overwrites within 14 to 72 hours, which is why preservation letters cannot wait.
• Witness statements. Independent witnesses with no relationship to either driver carry weight that party statements do not.
• Scene photographs and physical evidence. Skid marks, debris fields, vehicle resting positions, damage patterns, paint transfer.
• Accident reconstruction. A licensed reconstructionist applies physics and the vehicle damage profile to model what happened.
• Police report and supplemental investigation. The on-scene crash report is admissible only for limited purposes in Florida courts. The deputy’s testimony and any supplemental investigation matter more than the form itself.
• Expert testimony. Biomechanics, human factors, signal timing engineering. Brought in when the case warrants it.

A police citation is not a determination of fault. The civil case is independent of the traffic ticket.

How HB 837 Changed Florida Car Accident Cases

The 50% comparative-fault bar is the most discussed change from House Bill 837, but it is not the only one. The March 2023 reform reshaped several other parts of how a car accident case develops. The pieces that matter most to a typical client:

Statute of limitations cut from 4 years to 2 years

Fla. Stat. § 95.11 was amended to shorten the negligence statute of limitations from four years to two. The change applies to crashes on or after March 24, 2023. The narrower window is one of the most consequential procedural shifts of the reform: cases that had room for thorough pre-suit development under the old rule now have to be built faster.

Medical bill admissibility: § 768.0427

Fla. Stat. § 768.0427 governs what evidence of medical expenses can be put in front of a jury. For paid bills covered by health insurance, only the amount actually paid is admissible, not the gross billed amount. For unpaid bills under a letter of protection, admissibility is tied to reasonable charges measured against Medicare or Medicaid rates. For unpaid bills where the client has health insurance but did not use it, admissibility is limited to what that coverage would have paid, plus the client’s share. The change limits “phantom damages”: the gap between what a provider bills and what it would actually accept.

LOP disclosure requirements: § 768.0427

The same statute requires both parties to disclose any letter of protection in use, including the identity of the provider, the payment terms, and any referral relationship between the attorney and the provider. Carriers now ask for this disclosure early. We document LOPs from the day they are entered, because the disclosure framework requires it.

Bad faith claim procedure: § 624.155

Fla. Stat. § 624.155 was amended to add procedural and substantive requirements for bringing a bad faith insurance claim, including pre-suit notice obligations and a tightened standard for the carrier’s conduct. This affects how UM/UIM excess-judgment cases and BI excess exposure cases are positioned against a carrier.

The biggest practical change is a 90-day safe harbor: a carrier that tenders (offers to pay) its policy limits (or the amount demanded, if lower) within 90 days of receiving a documented claim is insulated from a bad faith action. That safe harbor runs on its own clock and is a separate idea from the deadline in our demand letter. The demand deadline tells us whether the carrier is engaging with the file; the safe harbor only decides whether its response can later support a bad faith claim. And when a carrier’s offer is a small fraction of a documented demand, we do not wait out its 90 days. We file.

Attorney’s fee shifts in insurance disputes

HB 837 also restructured Florida’s long-standing one-way attorney fee framework in insurance disputes (former Fla. Stat. § 627.428), tightening the financial dynamics of contested first-party claims. The change indirectly affects PI cases that involve UM/UIM or excess BI exposure.

The combined effect of these changes is faster pre-suit timelines, tighter documentation standards, and a smaller margin for error in how the file is built. At Prosper Injury Attorneys we have adjusted intake and demand procedures accordingly.

Most Common Causes of Crashes We Handle in Miami

Most of the car accident cases we take in Miami trace back to one of these patterns:

• Distracted driving. Texting, scrolling, eating, fiddling with the touchscreen. The single biggest cause of rear-end and lane-departure crashes in South Florida.
• Drunk and impaired driving. Alcohol, prescription opioids, recreational drug use. Most of our DUI-related cases come from late-night Brickell, South Beach, and Wynwood, plus the corridor between downtown and Hialeah on Friday and Saturday nights.
• Speeding and aggressive driving. The Palmetto Expressway, I-95 from the airport interchange north, the Dolphin Expressway (SR 836), and the Turnpike are where we see the worst of it in Miami-Dade. Florida’s afternoon thunderstorms add hydroplaning and pile-ups when drivers do not slow down for the rain.
• Running red lights and stop signs. Some Miami intersections have a chronic problem with this. Bird Road and 87th Avenue, NW 167th Street and 27th Avenue, Biscayne Boulevard north of the Julia Tuttle. Intersection cameras and surveillance footage from nearby businesses are usually how these cases get won.
• Rear-end collisions. Florida law presumes the rear driver is at fault, but insurance carriers still fight liability hard once injuries push the case value into six figures.
• T-bone and broadside crashes. Almost always involve someone running a light or violating a stop or yield sign. Often with significant injuries because the door panel offers very little crumple protection.
• Rideshare crashes. Uber and Lyft drivers in Miami are everywhere, and the rideshare insurance question gets complicated fast. There are different layers of coverage depending on whether the app was off, on but waiting for a ride, en route to a passenger, or actively transporting a passenger. See our Miami Uber accident lawyer and Miami Lyft accident lawyer pages for the details.

Common Car Accident Injuries

The injuries we see in Florida car accident cases range from soft-tissue strains that resolve in weeks to catastrophic, life-altering damage. The ones that drive most of our case work:

• Cervical and lumbar disc injuries. Herniated, bulging, and protruding discs in the neck and lower back. The most commonly disputed injury in car accident litigation. Adjusters argue these were preexisting or degenerative. MRI evidence and a clear before-and-after symptom history usually settle it.
• Whiplash and other soft-tissue injuries. Often the only symptom in the first 48 hours. Often dismissed as minor when the underlying ligament damage is real.
• Traumatic brain injuries. Concussions, post-concussion syndrome, and more severe TBIs. These often do not show up on a routine CT scan. Symptoms (memory issues, headaches, mood changes, light sensitivity) can take days to weeks to surface. Anyone who hit their head, lost consciousness, or “feels off” after a crash needs neuro evaluation.
• Broken bones. Wrists, hands, collarbones, ribs, ankles, hips. Common in higher-speed and side-impact crashes.
• Spinal cord injuries. Partial or complete paralysis with lifetime medical needs and lost earning capacity. The cases where we routinely see seven-figure recoveries.
• Psychological injuries. PTSD, anxiety, and panic disorder are common after high-impact crashes and after fatal crashes where a passenger or family member was killed. Recoverable as part of pain and suffering damages.

An injury does not have to start with the crash to be compensable. Florida law allows recovery when a crash aggravates a pre-existing condition: the degenerative disc that never caused pain until the collision, the old back injury that got permanently worse. Most adults over forty have some degenerative findings on an MRI, and adjusters lean on them hard. The before-and-after story in the medical records is what separates “that was already there” from “the crash made it worse,” and building that record is part of how we work up every case.

Get evaluated by a doctor even if you feel mostly okay. Symptoms develop over days. Insurance companies use gaps in treatment against injury claims.

Do I Need a Lawyer for a Minor Car Accident in Florida?

You may not need a lawyer for a genuinely minor car accident in Florida. If your injury shows no imaging findings, needs no specialist treatment, and fully resolves in 4 to 6 weeks of soft-tissue care, PIP usually covers it and a lawyer may not move the needle much. Cases that small often resolve in a four- or low-five-figure range whether you have representation or not. One caution before you wait and see: get medically evaluated within 14 days of the crash regardless, or you lose access to PIP entirely. The wait-and-see applies to hiring a lawyer, not to seeing a doctor.

The problem is that most people cannot tell on Day 1 whether their case is in that bucket. Disc herniations, traumatic brain injuries, rotator cuff tears, and other “real” injuries do not always show up immediately on imaging or in symptoms. A neck strain that seems mild after 48 hours can be diagnosed as a permanent C5-C6 herniation eight weeks in. An “I just feel a little off” complaint can turn out to be a documented mild TBI with measurable cognitive deficits.

The right time to make the lawyer-or-no-lawyer call is after a couple of weeks of treatment with a specialist who actually evaluates the injury, not after the first ER visit. If you are not sure, the consultation is free. Call and we will tell you whether your case is worth our time and yours.

How Much Is My Car Accident Case Worth?

There is no honest way to put a dollar figure on a car accident case without knowing the facts. What we can do is tell you which factors actually drive value:

• Available insurance. The single biggest cap on case value in non-commercial cases. A $1,000,000 case against a driver carrying $10,000 in BI is, in practical terms, often a $10,000 case unless there is UM/UIM on your side or a third-party defendant. Identifying every available policy is one of the first things we do.
• Severity and permanence of the injury. A soft-tissue strain that resolves in eight weeks has a different value than a fusion surgery, a TBI, or a permanent disability rating. Permanent injury under the § 627.737 threshold opens the door to the full range of damages.
• Medical bills, past and future. Documented expenses from the crash, plus the cost of treatment a doctor recommends going forward (future surgery, ongoing physical therapy, pain management, future imaging).
• Lost wages and lost earning capacity. Income you could not earn because you were injured, plus the long-term impact on your ability to work the way you did before. For a roofer with a back injury or a hairstylist with a wrist fracture, the future-earning-capacity component can dwarf the medical bills.
• Property damage. Not directly recoverable as injury damages, but it reads as a credibility signal. Cases with significant vehicle damage settle higher than cases where the carrier can argue “this was a fender-bender.”
• Pain and suffering. Non-economic damages tied to the physical pain, the emotional impact, and the disruption to day-to-day life. The hardest damages to value precisely, and the ones where strong representation makes the biggest difference.
• Comparative fault. Your percentage of fault reduces your recovery dollar-for-dollar.

An elderly client called us after she was T-boned and seriously injured making a left turn through oncoming traffic. She’d looked and seen no car for a good distance before starting the turn. Even so, the responding officer cited her, not the other driver. She was certain the at-fault driver had been going at least double the speed limit, and she struck me as honest and credible. I took her at her word, and decided her case was worth the time and money it would take to investigate properly. We moved quickly to put a preservation hold on the at-fault vehicle and sent an EDR extraction company to pull the data. The download showed the at-fault driver had been traveling at more than twice the posted speed limit at the moment of impact, with only one to two seconds of light braking before the collision. With that evidence on the file, the at-fault carrier tendered the full $250,000 bodily injury policy limits. The case resolved within ninety days of the crash.

At Prosper Injury Attorneys, we have recovered millions of dollars for car accident clients, including multiple seven-figure recoveries in catastrophic injury cases. We cannot put a number on your case until we know the facts, but we can usually tell you in a single phone call whether it is worth pursuing.

How Long Does a Florida Car Accident Case Take?

Most pre-suit car accident cases in Florida resolve in 6 to 18 months from the date of intake. Cases that proceed to litigation typically take 18 to 36 months from filing to resolution, depending on the court calendar and the complexity of the dispute.

What drives the timeline:

• Medical treatment. Cases generally do not settle until the client reaches “maximum medical improvement” (MMI), the point where doctors agree treatment has gone as far as it can. For soft-tissue cases that is often 3 to 6 months. For surgical cases or TBIs it can be 12 to 18 months or longer.
• Insurance discovery. Identifying every available policy (BI, UM/UIM, household members, employer, rideshare layer) takes time and sometimes requires formal discovery.
• Carrier engagement. Some carriers move quickly once a strong demand goes out. Others delay for months and require litigation pressure to take the case seriously.
• Court calendar. If the case gets filed, the timeline becomes whatever the assigned circuit judge’s calendar allows.

The biggest mistake clients make on timing is rushing to settle before reaching MMI. A case settled at month 4, before the MRI shows what is really wrong, almost always settles for far less than the same case settled at month 9 with full diagnosis on the file.

UM/UIM Coverage When the Other Driver Has No Insurance

Because Florida does not require drivers to carry bodily injury liability coverage, a meaningful percentage of the cars on Miami roads are insured only for the minimum: $10,000 in PIP plus $10,000 in property damage liability. Bodily injury is optional, and many drivers skip it.

Many more carry the bare-minimum $10,000/$20,000 BI policy that does not begin to cover a real injury case. We see catastrophic-injury cases every year where the at-fault driver has $10,000 in coverage and the injuries are worth a million.

Uninsured motorist (UM) and underinsured motorist (UIM) coverage is what fills that gap. UM/UIM is on your own policy, and it kicks in when the at-fault driver has no insurance, or has insurance but not enough to cover your damages. It pays for the same categories of damages the at-fault driver would have been responsible for: medical bills above PIP, lost wages, lost earning capacity, pain and suffering.

A few things people get wrong about UM/UIM:

• It pays even when the at-fault driver is uninsured, hit-and-run, or has no identifiable insurance.
• It can apply to anyone in the insured vehicle, and in some cases to insured household residents in another vehicle.
• It can be stacked on multiple vehicles in a household policy if stacking was not waived in writing at the time the policy was issued.
• The statute of limitations is five years, not two, because UM/UIM is a contract claim, not a tort claim.
• Carriers fight UM/UIM claims hard. They are not on your side just because you pay the premium.

A nineteen-year-old client called us after another firm dropped her car accident case because the at-fault driver had no bodily injury coverage. She’d hired one of the high-volume settlement mills, where each client is one of thousands and a “no BI” notation on the file is reason enough to close the case and move on. The first thing we did was check whether she had her own UM coverage. She did. The prior firm had never bothered to look. We pursued the UM claim and recovered the full tender of her policy limits.

How UM/UIM stacking works

If the policy covers more than one vehicle and stacking was not waived in writing at the time the policy issued, the UM coverage limit on each vehicle stacks. Two cars with $50,000 UM each becomes $100,000. Three vehicles, $150,000.

The single biggest determinant of whether stacking applies is the rejection form. Fla. Stat. § 627.727 requires that any rejection of UM coverage or stacking be made on the form approved by the Office of Insurance Regulation, signed by the named insured. Carriers regularly produce a vague form, an unsigned form, or an electronically initialed form that does not meet the statute. A defective rejection means the coverage stacks by default.

The household-member rule extends UM coverage to certain residents of the household even when they are not named on the policy. A passenger in the insured vehicle generally has UM coverage from that vehicle’s policy. A household resident driving a different vehicle may have UM coverage from a relative’s policy, depending on the policy language and the vehicle they were occupying.

A worked example. A client lives with a parent and an adult sibling. The household has three vehicles across two policies, each policy carrying $100,000 UM and no written stacking waiver on file. The client is a passenger in a friend’s car when an uninsured driver hits them. UM coverage from the household’s three vehicles can stack on top of any UM the friend’s vehicle carries, depending on the language of each policy and the carrier’s compliance with the § 627.727 rejection-form requirements.

Insurance discovery on a UM case is detailed work. At Prosper Injury Attorneys we track every household vehicle, every policy in force at the time of the crash, every rejection form, and every named insured.

We regularly take cases other firms turned away after a quick check came back “no insurance.” About half of those cases turn out to have UM/UIM available somewhere: on the client’s own policy, on a household member’s, or on the vehicle they were a passenger in. Insurance discovery is real work, and “no coverage” should never come from an unsolicited adjuster on the phone.

How Long Do I Have to File a Car Accident Lawsuit in Florida?

You have two years from the date of the crash to file a car accident lawsuit in Florida. Fla. Stat. § 95.11 was amended in March 2023 (HB 837) to cut the negligence statute of limitations in half, from four years to two years. The change applies to every Florida car accident occurring on or after March 24, 2023.

A few important variations:

• UM/UIM claims: five years, because they are contract claims, not tort claims.
• Wrongful death: two years from the date of death, separate from the underlying SOL on the negligence claim. See our Miami wrongful death lawyer page for cases where a family member was killed in a crash.
• Minor plaintiffs: the SOL can be tolled until the minor reaches the age of majority in some circumstances. The rule is narrow and should not be relied on.

What if I’m close to the two-year deadline?

Call anyway. We routinely take cases close to the deadline, sometimes within a few weeks of it. The work has to compress, and depending on the timeline we may need to file suit immediately to protect the case rather than running through the usual pre-suit process. “I’m close to the SOL” is not a reason to walk away from a real injury claim. The reason to walk away is when there is no actual case, and that is a separate conversation.

What to Do at the Scene of a Crash

If you are reading this in the first 24 hours after a crash, here is the short version:

1. Get to safety. If your car is drivable and blocking traffic, move it out of the lane. If you cannot move it, stay buckled and put your hazards on.
2. Call 911. Do not leave the scene. Florida law requires that you stop and report, and leaving can be a criminal offense. Report any injuries so paramedics can be dispatched.
3. Cooperate with police, but do not volunteer guesses. Describe what you saw and felt. Do not speculate about speeds, fault, or what the other driver was doing.
4. Get the driver exchange of information. Make sure you walk away with the other driver’s name, license number, registration, insurance information, and the assigned crash report number from the responding officer.
5. Photograph everything. Your vehicle, the other vehicle, the scene, the road conditions, debris, skid marks, traffic signals, and any visible injuries. More is better.
6. Get medical evaluation within 14 days. Florida PIP requires it. Even if you feel okay at the scene, internal injuries and brain injuries can hide in the first 24-72 hours. Go to the ER, an urgent care, or your primary care.
7. Don’t give a recorded statement. Not to the at-fault carrier, and not to your own carrier without representation. Adjusters know how to ask questions that lock you into harmful descriptions.
8. Call before you call the at-fault carrier back. (305) 694-2676. I can tell you on a short call whether you have a case worth pursuing.

Common Mistakes That Cost Car Accident Clients Money

The car accident cases that come out worse than they should are often not the hardest cases. They are the ones where a client made a recoverable mistake in the first few weeks after the crash. The patterns we see:

• Giving a recorded statement to the at-fault carrier. The adjuster sounds friendly, asks a few questions, and twenty minutes later you have boxed yourself in on every fact that mattered. They are trained to ask in a way that minimizes injury and shifts fault. Decline politely, say you will follow up through your attorney, and mean it.
• Posting on social media. Defense lawyers and insurance investigators check Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and LinkedIn early in the case. A photo from a friend’s wedding, a video of a workout, a check-in at a beach, can all be used to argue your injury is less serious than the file shows. Lock down or pause your accounts.
• Accepting a quick offer before reaching maximum medical improvement. Adjusters know the value of a case grows with the medical record. Settling at week 4 before the MRI shows what is really wrong almost always means leaving money on the table that could have funded surgery, future treatment, and lost income. The first offer is rarely the real number.
• Treating at a billboard “PIP clinic.” Some clinics that advertise heavily and run on volume produce records that read clearly as treatment-mill records. Adjusters discount their bills automatically. We refer clients to physicians whose records carry weight: orthopedists, neurologists, pain management specialists, and physical therapists with established practices in Miami-Dade.
• Missing the 14-day PIP treatment window. Florida PIP requires treatment within 14 days of the crash. Miss that window and you lose access to the $10,000 PIP coverage entirely. Even an urgent care or primary care visit within the window protects the eligibility.
• Signing a property damage release without reading it. Some property damage release forms include broad language that releases the bodily injury claim too. Read every release. If you are unsure, do not sign before talking to a lawyer.
• Waiting too long to call. Evidence overwrites, records get lost, and some of the most useful procedural steps are time-sensitive. Most of what decides a case happens in the first thirty days.

Frequently Asked Questions

How does Florida’s no-fault car insurance system actually work? Your own PIP coverage pays the first $10,000 of medical bills (80%) and lost wages (60%) regardless of fault, if you treat within 14 days of the crash. To recover beyond PIP from the at-fault driver, your injury must cross the “serious injury threshold” under Fla. Stat. § 627.737: permanent injury, significant scarring, loss of an important bodily function, or death.

What’s the difference between PIP and bodily injury (BI) coverage in Florida? PIP is on your own policy and pays your medical bills first, no fault analysis required. BI is on the at-fault driver’s policy and pays your damages once liability is established. PIP is required on every Florida policy. BI is not. Most states require drivers to carry bodily injury liability coverage. Florida is one of the very few that does not.

How much is my Florida car accident case worth? Case value depends on available insurance, the severity and permanence of the injury, total medical bills, lost wages and earning capacity, and your percentage of fault. We can usually tell on a single phone call whether your case is worth pursuing.

How long do I have to file? Two years from the date of the crash for crashes on or after March 24, 2023 (HB 837 cut the window from four years). UM/UIM claims have a five-year window because they are contract claims, not tort claims.

What if the at-fault driver had no insurance? You may still recover through your own uninsured/underinsured motorist (UM/UIM) coverage, a household member’s policy, or by stacking on multiple vehicles when stacking was not waived in writing. About half of the “no coverage” cases other firms turn away actually have UM somewhere.

Do I need a lawyer for a minor car accident in Florida? Maybe. The call is harder to make on Day 1 than people realize, because real injuries (disc herniations, traumatic brain injuries, rotator cuff tears) often do not show up immediately. The right time to make the lawyer-or-no-lawyer call is after a couple of weeks of specialist treatment, not after the first ER visit. The consultation is free.

Can I recover compensation if I was a passenger in a friend’s or family member’s car? Yes. Passenger claims are among the most common car accident claims in Florida, and they are usually the cleanest: a passenger is almost never at fault, so comparative fault rarely reduces the recovery. Many people hesitate because they do not want to raise a boyfriend’s, girlfriend’s, or relative’s insurance rates. But the claim is made against the driver’s insurance coverage, which is exactly what that coverage exists for, and as long as you are not an insured under that same policy, you can pursue it. PIP and UM coverage can also follow you as an occupant.

Call Miami Car Accident Lawyer Prosper Shaked

Most car accident cases get won quietly, in the file, in the first thirty days. Not in the courtroom three years later. Every day a piece of evidence sits unprotected, every week a client treats without a strategy behind it, makes the case harder to settle for what it is actually worth.

Call (305) 694-2676. You will reach an attorney, not an intake screener. Usually me, on that call or later the same day. My office is in North Miami Beach and we handle car accident cases throughout Florida.

Free consultation. Honest assessment. If you have a case worth pursuing, I will tell you. If you do not, I will tell you that too. No fee unless we recover for you.